Cysteine-reactive ligand discovery in proteomes

ABSTRACT

Cells produce electrophilic products with the potential to modify and affect the function of proteins. Chemoproteomic methods have provided a means to qualitatively inventory proteins targeted by endogenous electrophiles; however, ascertaining the potency and specificity of these reactions to identify the most sensitive sites in the proteome to electrophilic modification requires more quantitative methods. Here, we describe a competitive activity-based profiling method for quantifying the reactivity of electrophilic compounds against 1000+ cysteines in parallel in the human proteome. Using this approach, we identify a select set of proteins that constitute “hot spots” for modification by various lipid-derived electrophiles, including the oxidative stress product 4-hydroxynonenal (HNE). We show that one of these proteins, ZAK kinase, is labeled by HNE on a conserved, active site-proximal cysteine, resulting in enzyme inhibition to create a negative feedback mechanism that can suppress the activation of JNK pathways by oxidative stress.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

The subject patent application is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 14/911,316 (filed Feb. 10, 2016; now pending), which is a national stage application of International Application No. PCT/US2014/050828 (filed Aug. 13, 2014; now expired), which claims the benefit of priority to U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 61/865,165 (filed Aug. 13, 2013; now expired). The full disclosures of the priority applications are incorporated herein by reference in their entirety and for all purposes.

STATEMENT OF GOVERNMENT SUPPORT

This invention was made with government support under grant numbers CA087660 and ES020851 awarded by the National Institutes of Health. The government has certain rights in the invention.

BACKGROUND

The functional diversity of mammalian proteomes is greatly expanded by the post-translational modification (PTM) of proteins¹. A vast and structurally diverse array of PTMs occurs on proteins to regulate their activity, localization, and interactions with other biomolecules. Many PTMs are enzyme-catalyzed, such as protein phosphorylation, glycosylation, lipidation, and methylation. Our understanding of these enzyme-catalyzed PTMs has benefited greatly from chemoproteomic methods for their global profiling and functional characterization in biological systems^(2-4.)

Another important class of PTMs includes direct (non-enzymatic) oxidative or electrophilic modification of nucleophilic residues, such as cysteines, in proteins by reactive small molecules that are products of cellular redox reactions^(5,6). When cells, for instance, are subject to various forms of oxidative stress, such as chronic inflammation, hypoxia, or exposure to xenobiotics or environmental pollution, peroxidation of polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) in the membrane bilayer generates a broad range of secondary products, many of which are electrophilic in nature⁵. These endogenous lipid-derived electrophiles (LDEs) can modify DNA and proteins to promote cytotoxicity and have been implicated in the pathogenesis of many diseases, including cancer, inflammation, neurodegeneration, and cardiovascular disorders⁷. More recently, a growing body of studies has also suggested that, at lower and more physiological concentrations, LDEs can serve as messengers that modulate the response of signaling pathways to extracellular stimuli or stress⁸⁻¹⁰. 4-Hydroxynonenal (HNE), for instance, is a major product generated when free radicals initiate the non-enzymatic fragmentation of PUFAs in biological membranes^(5,11). The levels of HNE and HNE-protein adducts are elevated in cells and tissues exposed to oxidative stress, and HNE can regulate redox-responsive signaling pathways by still poorly understood mechanisms^(5,12,13). 15-deoxy-Δ12,14-prostaglandin J2 (15d-PGJ2) is another LDE produced by a set of enzymes that metabolize arachidonic acid¹⁴. 15d-PGJ2 exhibits anti-inflammatory and cytoprotective properties and has therefore been designated as a pro-resolving signal¹⁴. A third example is the LDE 2-trans-hexadecenal (2-HD), which is a product of sphingolipid metabolism and has recently been shown to function as a protein-modifying cofactor that promotes mitochondrial pathways for apoptosis¹⁵. Understanding the protein targets of LDEs is critical for elucidating their cellular functions and mechanisms of action.

Many drugs and drug candidates also act by covalent modification of cysteine residues, including omeprazole, clopidogrel, and afatinib. The discovery of additional cysteine-reactive chemical probes and drugs would benefit from a general method to globally map compound reactivity with cysteines in native biological systems.

A chemoproteomic method termed isoTOP-ABPP (isotopic Tandem Orthogonal Proteolysis-ABPP) and its use to quantify the intrinsic reactivity of cysteine residues in cell and tissue proteomes has been previously described by certain of the inventors herein³⁰. IsoTOP-ABPP measures cysteine reactivity by: 1) treating proteomes with an alkynylated electrophilic iodoacetamide (IA) probe at various concentrations (or for various time periods), 2) conjugation of reactions with isotopically-differentiated azide-biotin tags containing a Tobacco Etch Virus (TEV) cleavage sequence using copper-catalyzed azide-alkyne cycloaddition (CuAAC or click³¹) chemistry, and 3) enrichment, release, and identification/quantitation of IA-labeled cysteine-containing peptides by streptavidin chromatography, TEV protease treatment, and liquid chromatography-high-resolution mass spectrometry (LC-MS), respectively.

SUMMARY

In the present invention, isoTOP-ABPP has been advanced to discover and quantify reactions between cysteines and electrophilic metabolites in proteomes. In this advanced, ‘competitive’ version of isoTOP-ABPP (FIG. 1a ), a proteome is treated with an electrophile (experimental sample) or DMSO (control sample). Both proteomic samples are then labeled with the IA probe and conjugated by CuAAC to light and heavy azide-biotin tags, respectively. The light and heavy samples are then mixed and subjected to the previously described isoTOP-ABPP protocol for enrichment, identification, and quantification of IA-labeled cysteines³⁰. Electrophile-modified cysteines are quantified by measuring the MS1 chromatographic peak ratios (R values) for heavy (DMSO-treated) over light (electrophile-treated) samples, with higher R values reflecting greater sensitivity to the electrophile. In this format, competitive isoTOP-ABPP can assay electrophiles against 1000+ cysteines in parallel directly in native proteomes without requiring any chemical modification to the electrophiles themselves.

The invention, in various embodiments, is directed to a competitive isoTOP-ABPP method for identifying a protein target of selective cysteine modification by an electrophile, from among a set of proteins of a proteome, cell, tissue, or organism, comprising:

contacting the set of proteins of the proteome and the electrophile to provide an alkylated set of proteins, then,

contacting the alkylated set with an alkynylated iodoacetamide probe, followed by reaction with an azido compound comprising a first isotopic marker, to provide an isotopically-marked alkylated set, and

contacting the set of proteins of the proteome, not exposed to the electrophile, with an alkynylated iodoacetamide probe, followed by reaction with an azido compound comprising a second isotopic marker, to provide an isotopically-marked control set, then,

combining the isotopically-marked alkylated set and the isotopically-marked control set to provide a combined sample, and,

identifying the protein target and sites of modification of the electrophile by comparing the abundance of the first isotopic marker and the second isotopic marker for each protein of the set, wherein a target protein for the electrophile possess a relatively higher ratio of the second isotopic marker to the first isotopic marker, compared to an average ratio of second isotopic marker to first isotopic marker among the set of proteins of the combined sample.

The set of proteins can include one or more proteins, such as kinases. A target protein for the lipid-derived electrophiles identified by use of the inventive method has been found to be ZAK kinase. The electrophile can be a stress-induced lipid-derived electrophile such as 4-hydroxynonenal (HNE) or 15-deoxy-Δ12,14-prostaglandin J2. It is believed by the inventors herein that such stress-induced lipid-derived electrophiles act as messenger molecules that modulate the response of signaling pathways to extracellular stimuli or stress; accordingly the identification of the electrophile-targeted protein(s) from among the large number of proteins in a proteome of a cell can serve to identify cellular components that can then be used in the development of modulators for the identified protein, of which ZAK kinase is an example. Such modulators can be used in the control of signaling pathways, such as the activation of mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) pathways including the JNK, ERK, and p38 MAPK pathways that play roles in cancer and inflammation.

It has been discovered by the inventors herein that HNE selectively targets a cysteine residue of ZAK kinase, a mitogen-activated protein kinase kinase kinase (MAP3K) enzyme, in such a way as to confer sensitivity of the MAPK signaling pathways to lipid oxidation products. The identification of ZAK kinase by the method of the invention serves to identify a molecular target for development of ZAK kinase modulators, which can be used to modulate the activity of an MAPK-activating enzyme. Such modulators are believed to have potential as medicinal agents in the treatment of cancer and inflammation.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE FIGURES

FIG. 1 depicts an embodiment of a competitive isoTOP-ABPP for quantitative mapping of cysteine-reactive, lipid-derived electrophile (LDE) reactions in proteomes. (a) Competitive isoTOP-ABPP involves treatment of proteomes with DMSO or LDE, proteome labeling with an iodoacetamide-alkyne (IA) probe, CuAAC-based incorporation of isotopically-labeled, TEV protease-cleavable biotin tags, enrichment with streptavidin, and sequential on-bead protease digestions to afford probe-labeled peptides for MS analysis. The IA-probe and the competitive blockade of IA-cysteine reactions by an LDE are shown in the inset. (b) Structures of three LDEs, HNE, 15d-PGJ2 and 2-HD, used in competitive isoTOP-ABPP experiments, with their sites of reactivity marked with asterisks.

FIG. 2 depicts results of quantitative profiling of LDE-cysteine reactions in proteomes. (a) Distribution of competitive isoTOP-ABPP ratios (R values) quantified from reactions with the human MDA-MB-231 proteome treated with 100 μM HNE (left), 15d-PGJ2 (middle), or 2-HD (right). A cut-off of five-fold or greater blockade of IA-probe labeling (Rvalues>5) is shown by a dashed line to mark cysteines that exhibit high sensitivity to LDEs, and proteins with cysteines showing the strongest competitive reactivity with LDEs are labeled in green. (b) Heat map of cysteines with R values >5 illustrating examples of cysteines that display selectivity for reacting with one of the three tested LDEs (green boxes) and proteins that contain multiple IA-labeled cysteines, only one of which shows sensitivity to LDE competition (red boxes). (c) Representative MS1 profiles for peptides containing cysteines that show selective competition with 15d-PGJ2 (left) or HNE (right). (d) Representative MS1 profiles for multiple cysteine-containing peptides from the same protein, only one of which shows sensitivity to LDE competition. In each example, the LDE-sensitive cysteines is marked in red.

FIG. 3 shows results of determining the potency of HNE-cysteine reactions in proteomes and in cells. (a) Box-and-whisker plots showing the distribution of R values for ˜1100 cysteines quantified from competitive isoTOP-ABPP experiments with the MDA-MB-231 proteome treated with 5, 10, 50, 100, and 500 μM HNE. The IA-labeling of cysteines from ZAK, EEF2, RTN4, and FN3KRP exhibit exceptional sensitivity to HNE competition compared to the rest of the cysteines in the proteome. (b) Representative MS1 profiles for HNE-sensitive cysteines in ZAK and RTN4 showing concentration-dependent blockade of IA-labeling by HNE. (c) Distribution of R values quantified from competitive isoTOP-ABPP experiments with proteomes from MDA-MB-231 cells treated in situ with DMSO or HNE (100 μM, 60 min), confirming that cysteines in ZAK, EEF2, RTN4 and FN3KRP are also highly sensitive to HNE competition in living cells. (d) Comparison of R values obtained from in vitro versus in situ competitive isoTOP-ABPP experiments. Red and black diamonds mark cysteines that show similar or different in vitro versus in situ R values, respectively.

FIG. 4 depicts the functional characterization of HNE modification of ZAK kinase. (a) Crystal structure of human MAP3K9 (left, PDB: 3DTC) and multiple sequence alignment of ZAK with other 19 human MAP3Ks (SEQ ID NOs: 27-46) showing the HNE-sensitive cysteine C22 of ZAK is located next to the kinase's ATP binding loop (“P-loop”; note that C22 corresponds to 1150 in MAP3K9) and is unique to ZAK relative to other MAP3K enzymes. (b) Selective IA-labeling of wild-type (WT), but not C22A-ZAK, and concentration-dependent competition of IA-labeling of WT-ZAK by HNE as measured by gel-based ABPP using an IA-rhodamine probe. ZAK were expressed as FLAG-tagged proteins in HEK293T cells by stable transfection and immunoprecipitated prior to IA-probe labeling and analysis. (c) An HNE-alkyne probe (HNEyne16) selectively labels WT-, but not C22A-ZAK in proteomes and in living cells as determined by gel-based ABPP. (d) Catalytic activity of immunoprecipitated WT-, but not C22A-ZAK is inhibited by HNE as measured using a Myelin Basic Protein (MBP) substrate assay. A K45M-ZAK mutant, in which a conserved active-site lysine was mutated, showed no detectable activity and thus served as a catalytically dead control enzyme. All three ZAK variants (WT, C22A, and K45M were expressed at similar levels in transfected HEK293T cells). (e) Quantitative profiling of kinase activities in ZAK-transfected HEK293T proteomes treated with DMSO or HNE (100 μM, 30 min) by SILAC-ABPP using an acylphophate-ATP probe shows that the ATP-binding of ZAK is greatly impaired by HNE modification on C22. Other kinases detected in this assay were, in general unaffected by HNE treatment. For (d) and (e), data are presented as mean values±SEM; N>=3 experiments/group. **, P<0.01, ***, P<0.001, t-test.

FIG. 5 shows that HNE modification of ZAK suppresses JNK pathway activation in cells. (a) WT-ZAK-transfected HEK-293T cells show higher basal JNK activation compared to mock-, C22A-ZAK-, or K45M-ZAK-transfected. (b), (c) Western blots (b) and normalized phosphorylated JNK levels (c) showing that H₂O₂ treatment (1 mM, 30 min) increases JNK activation in WT- and C22A-ZAK cells and this increase is blocked or amplified in WT- and C22A-ZAK cells, respectively by pre-treatment with HNE (100 μM, 30 min). (d) A model diagramming ZAK-dependent and ZAK-independent pathways for HNE modulation of JNK activation. Dashed line designates the potential for oxidative stress to generate HNE and initiate a negative feedback loop to limit JNK activation. (e), (f) Western blots (e) and normalized phosphorylated JNK levels (f) showing dramatic, concentration-dependent activation of JNK by HNE (50 or 100 μM, 60 min) in C22A-ZAK cells, but not in WT-ZAK cells. Note that mock- and K45M-ZAK transfected cells also show modest, but significant elevations in JNK activity following HNE treatment, which is consistent with previous studies indicating that HNE can activate JNK by multiple pathways^(42,43,57) For (a), (c) and (f), data are presented as mean values SEM; N=4 experiments/group. *, P<0.05, **, P<0.01 ##, P<0.01, t-test.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

A competitive isotopic Tandem Orthogonal Proteolysis Activity-Based Protein Profiling (isoTOP-ABPP) method for quantifying the reactivity of electrophilic compounds against 1000+ proteins comprising reactive cysteines in parallel in the human proteome is disclosed and claimed herein. Using this approach, we identify select sets of proteins that are preferentially modified by HNE and 15d-PGJ2. We show that one of these proteins, ZAK kinase, is labeled (alkylated) by HNE on a conserved, active site-proximal cysteine residue, which inhibits the enzyme and suppresses the activation of JNK pathways by oxidative stress in cancer cells.

The invention provides, in various embodiments, a competitive isoTOP-ABPP method for identifying a protein target of selective cysteine modification by an electrophile, from among a set of proteins of a proteome, cell, tissue, or organism, comprising:

contacting the set of proteins of the proteome and the electrophile to provide an alkylated set of proteins, then,

contacting the alkylated set with an alkynylated iodoacetamide probe, followed by reaction with an azido compound comprising a first isotopic marker, to provide an isotopically-marked alkylated set, and

contacting the set of proteins of the proteome, not exposed to the electrophile, with an alkynylated iodoacetamide probe, followed by reaction with an azido compound comprising a second isotopic marker, to provide an isotopically-marked control set, then,

combining the isotopically-marked alkylated set and the isotopically-marked control set to provide a combined sample, and,

identifying the protein target and sites of modification of the electrophile by comparing the abundance of the first isotopic marker and the second isotopic marker for each protein of the set, wherein a target protein for the electrophile possess a relatively higher ratio of the second isotopic marker to the first isotopic marker, compared to an average ratio of second isotopic marker to first isotopic marker among the set of proteins of the combined sample.

For example, the set of proteins can include one or more proteins, such as ZAK kinase.

The electrophile can be a lipid derived electrophile, such as a stress-induced electrophile, wherein the protein target of the electrophile is a kinase. The kinase can comprise a cysteine residue that is alkylated by the electrophile, and when the electrophile comprises an α,β-unsaturated carbonyl group, such as 4-hydroxynonenal or 15-deoxy-Δ12,14-prostaglandin J2, the electrophile can react with the cysteine by a Michael conjugate addition.

By identification of a protein target of an electrophile, the protein target of the electrophile can be used as a substrate for identification of further inhibitors thereof, by screening a plurality of candidate compounds for modulation of the kinase protein target to identify one or more selective kinase modulator. A selective kinase modulator is a potential medicinal compound for treatment of a condition wherein modulation, e.g., inhibition, of the kinase activity is medically indicated. For example, a selective modulator of the kinase protein target so identified can be a reversible inhibitor of the kinase protein target, which can be suitable for development as a medicament for treatment of the condition in human beings, e.g., for treatment of cancer or of inflammation.

The invention also provides, in various embodiments, a protein identified as a target of an electrophile by the method of the invention. The protein can be a kinase, such as ZAK kinase, and can be used for the development of kinase modulators, e.g., a ZAK kinase inhibitor suitable for administration to a human subject suffering from a condition such as cancer or inflammation wherein modulation of the kinase is medically indicated.

Quantitative Profiling of Electrophile-Cysteine Reactions in Proteomes.

Among the 20 protein-coding amino acids, cysteine is unique owing to its intrinsically high nucleophilicity, which renders its sensitivity to modification by endogenous electrophiles and oxidants⁶, as well as electrophilic xenobiotics and candidate therapeutics^(23,24). Cysteine reactions with electrophilic metabolites have been characterized for purified proteins.^(25,26) and, on a global scale in cells and tissues using mass spectrometry-based chemoproteomic^(5,16-22) and imaging methods²⁷. These studies, along with analytical, quantum mechanical, and kinetic work^(28,29), have, for the most part, confirmed the preferential reactivity that Michael acceptor electrophiles like HNE show for cysteine over other potentially nucleophilic amino acids (e.g., lysine, histidine) in proteomes. We were interested in building on these past findings to determine whether individual cysteines in the proteome display differences in their reactivity with endogenous electrophiles, and, if so, whether potential hot-spots for electrophile modification might constitute key nodes in signaling pathways of redox sensing and response.

We previously described a chemoproteomic method termed isoTOP-ABPP (isotopic Tandem Orthogonal Proteolysis-ABPP) and its use to quantify the intrinsic reactivity of cysteine residues in cell and tissue proteomes³⁰. isoTOP-ABPP measures cysteine reactivity by: 1) treating proteomes with an alkynylated electrophilic iodoacetamide (IA) probe at various concentrations (or for various time periods), 2) conjugation of reactions with isotopically-differentiated azide-biotin tags containing a Tobacco Etch Virus (TEV) cleavage sequence using copper-catalyzed azide-alkyne cycloaddition (CuAAC or click³¹) chemistry, and 3) enrichment, release, and identification/quantitation of IA-labeled cysteine-containing peptides by streptavidin chromatography, TEV protease treatment, and liquid chromatography-high-resolution mass spectrometry (LC-MS), respectively.

Here, we envisioned that isoTOP-ABPP could be advanced to discover and quantify reactions between cysteines in proteomes and any electrophilic compound. In this advanced, ‘competitive’ version of isoTOP-ABPP (FIG. 1a ), a proteome is treated with an electrophile (experimental sample) or DMSO (control sample). Both proteomic samples are then labeled with the IA probe and conjugated by CuAAC to light and heavy azide-biotin tags, respectively. The light and heavy samples are then mixed and subjected to our described isoTOP-ABPP protocol for enrichment, identification, and quantification of IA-labeled cysteines³⁰. Electrophile-modified cysteines are quantified by measuring the MS1 chromatographic peak ratios (R values) for heavy (DMSO-treated) over light (electrophile-treated) samples, with higher R values reflecting greater sensitivity to the electrophile. In this format, competitive isoTOP-ABPP can assay electrophiles against 1000+ cysteines in parallel directly in native proteomes without requiring any chemical modification to the electrophiles themselves.

We applied competitive isoTOP-ABPP to quantitatively profile the proteome reactivity of three representative endogenous electrophiles—HNE, 15d-PGJ2, and 2-HD, each of which possesses an α,β-unsaturated carbonyl that can react with nucleophilic cysteines via Michael addition (FIG. 1b ). Competitive isoTOP-ABPP experiments were performed in quadruplicate using the soluble proteome of the human breast cancer cell line MDA-MB-231 cell line. Proteomes were treated with 100 μM HNE, 15d-PGJ2, or 2-HD, for 60 minutes, followed by the IA-probe (100 μM, 60 min). A total of 1400 cysteine reactivities were quantified across the aggregate data set, with at least 900 cysteine reactivities quantified for each LDE (FIG. 2a ) more than 750 of which were quantified for all the three electrophiles. Most of the cysteine reactivities (>98%) were unaffected or only marginally affected by LDE treatment (R<5); however, a select subgroup showed marked reductions in their IA-probe reactivities (R>5) following exposure to one or more LDEs (FIG. 2a ). A closer examination of these LDE-inhibited cysteines revealed a distinct proteome reactivity profile for each tested electrophile, with NE and 15d-PGJ2 both targeting several cysteines in the proteome, the majority of which showed preferential reactivity with one of the two LDEs, and 2-HD exhibiting no detectable high sensitivity (R>5) targets (FIG. 2a ).

The quantitative ranking of cysteines based on the magnitude and selectivity of their inhibition illuminated “hot spots” for LDE reactivity in the proteome (FIG. 2a and Table 1). Examples included Cys22 of ZAK (or MLTK/MLK7) and Cys848 of MMS19, which were completely blocked with notable selectivity by HNE and 15d-PGJ2, respectively (FIG. 2c ). Competitive isoTOP-ABPP also identified several proteins that possess multiple reactive cysteines, only one of which proved sensitive to competitive blockade by an LDE (FIG. 2d ). These data demonstrate that the quantified R values reflect measurements of individual LDE-cysteine reactions rather than general changes in protein abundance potentially caused by LDE exposure. In this regard, we did not observe any instances of multiple LDE-sensitive cysteines appearing on the same protein (see Table 1, below). We also asked whether the intrinsic reactivity of cysteines, as determined previously by measuring their extents and rates of IA labeling³⁰, might be predictive of sensitivity to LDEs. However, we found that most of the LDE-sensitive cysteines displayed moderate, rather than high IA-reactivity, suggesting that their modification by LDEs depend not only on cysteine nucleophilicity, but also on molecular recognition of the LDEs.

Determining the Potency of HNE-Cysteine Reactions in Proteomes

Having found that individual LDEs show markedly distinct cysteine-reactivity profiles, we next focused on identifying the most sensitive sites for LDE reactivity in the proteome by performing a concentration-dependent analysis with HNE. The MDA-MB-231 cell proteome was treated with varying concentrations of HNE (5, 10, 50, 100 and 500 μM) for 60 min and then the IA-labeling profile of each reaction was quantitatively compared to a DMSO-control sample by isoTOP-ABPP. In aggregate, these profiles identified ˜1100 IA-labeled cysteines, many of which showed reduced labeling signals in the presence of HNE, including 8 of the 14 HNE-modified cysteines identified in a previous proteomic study that used a biotinamidohexanoic acid hydrazide probe to enrich and identify (but not to quantify) HNE-modified cysteines¹⁷.

By combining the R values at all 5HNE concentrations, we could extrapolate IC50 values for HNE-blockade of IA probe-labeling for ˜700 of the 1100 cysteines (FIG. 3a ). This analysis revealed that the vast majority of cysteines were modified by HNE with low potency (IC50 values>100 μM), but a select few cysteines, including C22 of ZAK, C41 of EEF2, C24 of FN3KRP, and C1001 of RTN4, exhibited much higher sensitivities with IC50 values ranging from 6 to 23 μM (FIG. 3a, b ). We next tested whether these hypersensitive cysteines were also inhibited by HNE in situ by treating MDA-MB-231 cells with 50 or 100 μM HNE and then preparing proteomes for analysis by competitive isoTOP-ABPP. These experiments confirmed that the most HNE-sensitive cysteines identified in vitro were also strongly inhibited by HNE in situ (FIG. 3c, d ). We also uncovered another set of cysteines that showed reductions in IA-probe labeling in situ, but not in vitro (FIG. 3d , black diamonds). This finding suggests that certain proteins may preferentially react with HNE in living cells, although we cannot exclude at this point that the reductions in IA probe labeling observed for these proteins reflect a decrease in their overall abundance in HNE-treated cells.

Functional Characterization of HNE Modification of ZAK Kinase

ZAK kinase (also known as MLK7 or MLTK) is part of the mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) network and functions as a MAPK kinase kinase (MAP3K)^(32,33) There are at least 20 MAP3Ks encoded by the human genome and they are activated by diverse stimuli to phosphorylate and activate downstream MAPK kinases (MAP2Ks) to regulate critical cellular functions, such as differentiation, proliferation and apoptosis³⁴. Previous studies have shown that ZAK can activate all three major MAPK (ERK, JNK, and p38) pathways in mammalian cells,^(32,35,36) with some preference for JNK³² and is involved in response pathways to stressors such as osmotic shock³³, UV radiation³⁷, and chemotherapeutic agents³⁶. Sequence and structure comparisons allowed us to map the HNE-sensitive cysteine in ZAK (C22) to a location proximal to the glycine-rich ATPbinding loop (“P-loop”) (FIG. 4a ). Interestingly, among all 20 human MAP3Ks, ZAK is the only member that possesses a cysteine at this position (FIG. 4a ), and this cysteine is highly conserved across ZAK orthologues in vertebrates.

This information, combined with the high sensitivity displayed by C22 for HNE (FIG. 3a ) motivated us to further characterize this interaction and its impact on ZAK activity. We first expressed FLAG-tagged versions of wild type (WT) and a C22A mutant of ZAK by stable transfection in HEK293T cells and found that WT-ZAK showed much stronger IA-rhodamine probe labeling as measured by gel-based ABPP. This result is consistent with our isoTOP-ABPP data sets, which identified C22 as the most IA-reactive cysteine in ZAK30. The gel signals for IA-labeling of WT-ZAK were blocked by pretreatment with HNE over a concentration range that closely matched the HNE-sensitivity profile observed for C22 in competitive isoTOP-ABPP experiments (FIG. 4b , compare to FIG. 3a ). Given that competitive isoTOP-ABPP measures blockade of IA-labeling of cysteines by LDEs, we next used an alkyne-functionalized HNE probe (HNEyne)¹⁶ to verify direct labeling of WT-, but not the C22A-ZAK mutant in vitro and in living cells (FIG. 4c ). We then assessed the impact of HNE labeling on ZAK activity using an in vitro Myelin Basic Protein (MBP) substrate assay³⁸ which showed that HNE inhibited WT-, but not C22A-ZAK in a concentration-dependent manner (FIG. 4d ). We note that C22AZAK exhibited reduced basal activity compared to WT-ZAK, but the residual activity of C22-ZAK, which was still much greater than a catalytically dead K45M-ZAK mutant, was insensitive to HNE (FIG. 4d ). Taken together, these data indicate that C22 contributes to the intrinsic catalytic activity of ZAK and reaction of this residue with HNE produces complete inhibition of the kinase. Considering further that C22 is predicted to reside adjacent to the ATP-binding loop of ZAK, we postulated that the HNE-induced loss of kinase activity might be due to blockade of ATP-binding. We tested this hypothesis by performing a competitive SILAC (Stable Isotope Labeling by Amino acids in Cell culture)-ABPP39 experiment using an acylphosphate-ATP probe⁴⁰, which revealed that probe-labeling of ZAK, but not other kinases, was profoundly reduced in cell proteomes treated with HNE (FIG. 4e ).

HNE Modification of ZAK Suppresses JNK Pathway Activation in Cells

We next set out to assess the functional effects of HNE modification of ZAK in human cells. HEK-293T cells were stably transfected with cDNAs for WT-ZAK, C22A-ZAK, or K45M-ZAK and the activation state of their MAPK signaling pathways was monitored by western blotting with anti-phosphoprotein antibodies. WT-ZAK-expressing cells, but not C22A- or K45M-ZAK-expressing cells showed significantly increased JNK and, to a lesser extent, p38 and ERK pathway activation compared to mock-transfected cells (FIG. 5a, b ). These cellular data are consistent with previous studies showing that overexpression of WT-ZAK in mammalian cells preferentially activates the JNK pathway³² and with our in vitro substrate assay results, which revealed substantially reduced and complete loss of activity for the C22A- and K45M ZAK mutants, respectively (FIG. 4d ). We next treated cells with H₂O₂ (1 mM, 30 min) to induce oxidative stress, a process that is known to activate the JNK pathway^(41,42). H₂O₂ treatment stimulated JNK activity in both WT- and C22A-ZAK-transfected cells (but not K45M-ZAK-transfected cells), with WT-ZAK cells showing the greater level of activation (FIG. 5b,c ). Strikingly, however, pre-treatment with HNE (100 μM, 30 min) produced opposing effects in WT- and C22A-ZAK cells, blocking H₂O₂-dependent JNK activation in the former cell model, while hyper-activating JNK activity in the latter. We interpret these findings to indicate the existence of both ZAK-dependent and ZAK-independent pathways for HNE modulation of JNK activation (FIG. 5d ). By modifying C22 on ZAK, HNE blocks the contribution that this kinase makes to the activation of the JNK pathway. HNE is also known to itself promote oxidative stress^(43,44) that likely adds to the effects of H₂O₂ and, in the context of an HNE-resistant C22A-ZAK mutant, would serve to further augment activation of the JNK pathway. In this model, the HNE-ZAK interaction acts as a negative-feedback loop that tempers activation of the JNK pathway under high and/or persistent levels of oxidative stress (FIG. 5d ). We further tested this idea by evaluating the effects of HNE alone on JNK pathway activity in ZAK-transfected cells. A dramatic concentration-dependent activation of JNK was observed in C22A-ZAK-transfected cells, but not in WT-ZAK-transfected cells, which showed higher basal JNK activation that was mostly unaffected by HNE (FIG. 5e,f ). While we were initially surprised that HNE treatment did not appear to block the basal JNK activation caused by WT-ZAK, we should note that HNE also activated JNK in mock-transfected cells to a level that matched the basal JNK activity observed in WT-ZAK-transfected cells. Thus, the residual JNK activation observed in WT-ZAK-transfected cells may reflect ZAK-independent pathways of JNK activation by HNE (FIG. 5e,f ). That JNK activation was much higher in C22A-ZAK cells compared to the other cell models indicates this HNE-insensitive form of ZAK, which still retains some catalytic activity (see FIG. 4d ), combines with ZAK-independent, HNE-stimulated pathways to further enhance JNK activation.

Long viewed as biomarkers of oxidative damage, LDEs have more recently gained attention as second messengers that can regulate diverse cellular processes^(8,9). These findings have inspired the advent of chemoproteomic methods to globally map LDE-protein interactions^(5,16-19). To date, these large-scale profiling efforts have focused on the qualitative inventorying of LDE-reactive proteins in cell and tissue proteomes, generating lists of many candidate targets and pathways for LDE action. Considering, however, that the signaling and pathophysiological functions of LDEs may differ across the endogenous concentration ranges found for these compounds, it is imperative to understand the potencies of LDE-protein interactions in biological systems. Building on past studies showing that cysteine residues are the principal sites of protein modification by HNE^(28,29), we created a competitive isoTOP-ABPP platform to quantitatively map LDE reactivity across 1000+ cysteines in parallel directly in native proteomes. The output of this study was the identification of discrete sites of hypersensitivity, or “hot spots”, for LDE modification in the human proteome. Notably, most of these sites show clear preference for reacting with one of the three tested LDEs (HNE, 15d-PGJ2, 2-HD) and moderate, but not extreme levels of intrinsic reactivity. These findings, taken together, indicate that the potency of LDE-protein reactions in the proteome is dictated by a combination of molecular recognition and enhanced cysteine nucleophilicity.

Among the most LDE-sensitive cysteines, C22 of ZAK stood out as a particularly intriguing event, given the proposed role that this kinase plays in activating JNK, ERK, and p38 MAPK pathways in both cancer³⁵ and inflammation³⁶. To date, only a handful of studies have investigated ZAK function and its modes of regulation remain poorly understood. Our findings identified ZAK as one of the highest potency targets of HNE in the human proteome. That HNE inhibits human ZAK by modifying an active site-proximal cysteine conserved among ZAK orthologues, but not other MAP3K enzymes, suggests ZAK acts as a special node in MAPK signaling pathways that confers sensitivity to lipid oxidation products. In this way, HNE modification of ZAK may limit the extent of JNK activation caused by oxidative stress, which could help certain cell types, such as tumor and immune cells, survive in the presence of high levels of reactive oxygen species. Further studies of ZAK function would benefit from the development of selective inhibitors for this enzyme. It is noteworthy, in this regard, that covalent inhibitors have recently been introduced for many kinases^(24,45-47). These inhibitors often target cysteine residues in or near kinase active sites, which leads us to speculate that the C22-HNE interaction discovered herein may offer a medicinal chemistry starting point for the development of ZAK inhibitors. Toward this end, competitive ABPP methods should offer a useful strategy to assess inhibitor target engagement and selectivity⁴⁸. Beyond ZAK, we also identified several other kinases in our competitive isoTOP-ABPP experiments that possess cysteines that were inhibited by HNE, albeit with lower potencies. Prominent among these was cysteine (C311) in AKT1/2/3, which is an active site-proximal residue implicated in substrate-binding⁴⁹ and was inhibited by HNE with an IC50 value of ˜60 μM. These proteomic findings nicely confirm recent work showing that recombinant AKT2 is modified by HNE on C31125. Finally, we should emphasize that C22 in ZAK is just one of several hypersensitive sites for LDE modification identified in our competitive isoTOP-ABPP experiments (FIG. 2). We expect that more in-depth biological studies on these high-sensitivity targets of LDEs will reveal additional modes of crosstalk between oxidative stress and signaling pathways in mammalian cells.

From a methodological perspective, we believe that competitive isoTOP-ABPP offers several advantages over more conventional proteomic approaches for the discovery and characterization of protein-small molecule reactions in biological systems. First, quantitative inhibition values are measured in relative terms that are independent of absolute protein abundance. The method is therefore able to sift through signals that span a broad range of intensities to identify reactive sites that are more likely to bear functional consequence. Here, the site-specificity afforded by isoTOP-ABPP is important, since it permits the discovery of potent electrophile-cysteine reactions that may occur on proteins that display several lower-affinity cysteine-electrophile adducts (e.g., EEF2, FIG. 2d ). Electrophiles also vary considerably in their structures and the stability of the protein adducts that they form. These features can complicate the direct detection of electrophile-protein interactions in proteomic studies.

Table 1, below, shows peptide sequences, parental protein names, and R values for IA-labeled cysteines that exhibit IA-labeling competed by one or more LDE with R values>5. HNE-competed cysteines are shaded in pink and 15d-PGJ2-competed cysteines are shaded in green. Note that REEP5 displays significant competition by both LDEs.

The isoTOP-ABPP method ABPP for quantitative mapping of cysteine-reactive, lipid-derived electrophile (LDE) reactions in proteomes, cells, tissues, or organisms can be used to determine if one or more proteins in the set of proteins therefrom possesses one or more domains, each comprising a reactive cysteine residue, has at least a low affinity (e.g., high micromolar affinity) for any selected structural module, and serves to identify what protein has that affinity. By combining a plurality of low-affinity structural modules having affinity for a particular protein binding site, a high affinity ligand for that protein can be constructed. Identification of a high affinity ligand can serve as a structural lead in the development of compounds targeting a particular protein, which can lead to the development of medicinal compounds. Similarly, identification of the protein target of the ligand can be of value in determining a possibly unknown function for the targeted protein.

TABLE 1 IPI number Name Sequence 4-HNE PGJ2 2-HD IPI00099986.5 FN3KRP ATGHSGGGC*ISQGR (SEQ ID NO: 3) >15   1.62 1.03 IPI00329638.10 ZAK FDDLQFFENC*GGGSFGSVYR (SEQ ID NO: 4) >15   4.24 1.05 IPI00021766.4 RTN4 YSNSALGHVNC*TIK (SEQ ID NO: 5)  11.78   2.93 1.1  IPI00186290.6 EEF2 STLTDSLVC*K (SEQ ID NO: 6)  11.63   3.31 1.06 IPI00141318.2 CKAP4 SSSSSSASAAAAAAAASSSASC*SR    7.73   3.33 1.08 (SEQ ID NO: 7) IPI00024670.5 REEP5 NC*MTDLLAK (SEQ ID NO: 8)   7.08   7.38 1.18 IPI00018235.3 PEF1 QALVNC*NWSSFNDETCLMMINMFDK    5.14   2.9 1.25 (SEQ ID NO: 9) IPI00024673.2 MAPK9 TLEEFQDVYLVMELMDANLC*QVIHMELDHER    5.08   1.78 1.14 (SEQ ID NO: 10) IPI00154451.6 MMS19 LMGLLSDPELGPAAADGFSLLMSDC*TDVLTR    1.78 >15 1.1  (SEQ ID NO: 11) IPI00010158.3 CHRAC1 ATELFVQC*LATYSYR (SEQ ID NO: 12)   1.94  12.32 1.06 IPI00551062.2 TNRC5 QC*DVLVEEFEEVIEDWYR (SEQ ID NO: 13)   1.29  11.77 1.06 IPI00024254.3 IFIT3 GLNPLNAYSDLAEFLETEC*YQTPFNK    1.51   9.43 1.23 (SEQ ID NO: 14) IPI00639841.2 PEC1 WLSDEC*TNAVVNFLSR (SEQ ID NO: 15)   1.86   8.23 1.06 IPI00302925.3 CCT8 IAVYSC*PFDGMITETK (SEQ ID NO: 16)   1.14   7.75 1.06 IPI00155601.1 MACROD1 LEVDAIVNAANSSLLGGGGVDGC*IHR    1.56   7.65 1.02 (SEQ ID NO: 17) IPI00003814.1 MAP2K6 MC*DFGISGYLVDSVAK (SEQ ID NO: 18)   1.9   7.43 1.15 IPI00219103.6 HPCA LLQC*DPSSASQF (SEQ ID NO: 19)   2.17   7.21 1.13 IPI00793696.1 RPL24 C*ESAFLSK (SEQ ID NO: 20)   1.74   6.78 1.25 IPI00027223.2 IDH1 SEGGFIWAC*K (SEQ ID NO: 21)   1.3   6.66 1.13 IPI00021329.3 WDR45L C*NYLALVGGGK (SEQ ID NO: 22)   3.34   6.45 1.06 IPI00640155.1 PSMB8 LLSNMMC*QYR (SEQ ID NO: 23)   1.19   5.86 1.05 IPI00022431.1 AHSG C*DSSPDSAEDVR (SEQ ID NO: 24)   1.35   5.73 1.12 IPI00007675.6 DYNC1L11 VGSFGSSPPGLSSTYTGGPLGNEIASGNGGAAAGD   2.59   5.18 1.1  DEDGQNLWSC*ILSEVSTR (SEQ ID NO: 25) IPI00010153.5 RPL23 ISLGLPVGAVINC*ADNTGAK   1.73   5.06 1.87 (SEQ ID NO: 26)

Examples Preparation of Human Cancer Cell Line Proteomes

MDA-MB-231 cells were grown in L15 media supplemented with 10% fetal bovine serum at 37° C. in a CO₂-free incubator. For in vitro labeling experiments, cells were grown to 100% confluency, washed three times with PBS and scraped in cold PBS. Cell pellets were isolated by centrifugation at 1400×g for 3 min, and the cell pellets stored at −80° C. until further use. The harvested cell pellets were lysed by sonication in PBS buffer and fractionated by centrifugation (100,000×g, 45 min.) to yield soluble and membrane proteomes. The proteomes were prepared fresh from the frozen cell pallets prior to each experiment.

In Vitro LDE Treatment

HNE was purchased from EMD biosciences, 15d-PGJ2 was purchased from Cayman Chemicals and 2-HD was purchased from Santa Cruz Biotechnology. Proteome samples were diluted to a 4 mg protein/mL solution in PBS. For each profiling experiment, one aliquot of the proteome sample (0.5 mL) was treated with 100 μM of LDE using 5 μL of a 10 mM stock and the other aliquot was treated with 5 μL of either ethanol (for HNE and 15d-PGJ2) or DMSO (for 2-HD) as control. For the concentration-dependent profiling experiments using HNE, aliquots of the proteomes (0.5 mL each) were treated with 5, 10, 50, 100 and 500 μM of HNE using 5 μL of 0.5, 1.0, 5, 10 and 50 mM of stock solution, respectively. After 60 minutes of treatment at room temperature, both the LDE-treated and control aliquots were passed through a NAP-5 Sephadex column (GE healthcare) to remove any unreacted LDE. The volume of each aliquot was increased to 1 mL with the concentration at 2 mg/mL after this step.

In Situ HNE Treatment

After MDA-MB-231 cells were grown to 100% confluency, the media was removed and replaced with fresh serum-free media containing 100 μM HNE (20 μL of 50 mM stock in 10 mL media). A control flask of cells was treated with 10 mL of serum-free media containing 20 uL of ethanol in parallel. The cells were incubated at 37° C. for 1 hour and harvested as detailed above to prepare HNE-treated and control proteomes, respectively.

Protein Labeling and Click Chemistry

Each of the control and LDE-treated proteome samples (˜2 mg protein/mL in 1 mL volume) was treated with 100 μM of IA-probe using 10 μL of a 10 mM stock in DMSO. The labeling reactions were incubated at room temperature for 1 hour. Click chemistry (acetylene-azide cycloaddition) was performed by the addition of 100 μM of either the Heavy-TEV-Tag (for the control sample) or Light-TEV-Tag (for the LDE-treated sample) (20 μL of a 5 mM stock), 1 mM TCEP (fresh 50× stock in water), 100 μM ligand (17× stock in DMSO:t-Butanol 1:4) and 1 mM CuSO₄ (50× stock in water). Samples were allowed to react at room temperature for 1 hour. After the click chemistry step, the light and heavy-labeled samples were mixed together and centrifuged (5900×g, 4 min, 4° C.) to pellet the precipitated proteins.

The pellets were washed twice in cold MeOH, after which the pellet was solubilized in PBS containing 1.2% SDS via sonication and heating (5 min, 80° C.). Samples were subjected to streptavidin enrichment of probe-labeled proteins, sequential on-bead trypsin and TEV digestion, and liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC-MS) analysis according to the published isoTOP-ABPP protocol³⁰.

MS Data Analysis

IA-probe labeled peptides were identified by SEQUEST2 and DTASelect3, and the quantification of heavy/light ratios (isoTOP-ABPP ratios, R) was performed by an in-house software (CIMAGE) as previously described. The software was advanced to be able to detect and quantify cases where near complete LDE blockade of IA-probe labeling was achieved (e.g., very small or no light peak) and assign an empirical ratio cut-off of 15 to each of such cases. Each experiment consisted of multiple LC/LCMS/MS runs: either HNE, 15d-PGJ2 and 2-HD 100 μM competition, or HNE competition at different concentrations. All runs were searched using SEQUEST and filtered with DTASelect as described above. Because the mass-spectrometer was configured for data-dependant fragmentation, peptides are not always identified in every run. In the case of probe-modified peptides that were sequenced in one, but not the other runs, a featured algorithm of CIMAGE was utilized to identify the corresponding peak pairs in the runs without the SEQUEST identification and obtain quantification as previously described. In all cases, the false-positive rate after quantification was found to be less than 1%.

After ratios for unique peptide entries are calculated for each experiment, overlapping peptides with the same labeled cysteine (e.g., same local sequence around the labeled cysteines but different charge states, MudPIT segment numbers, or tryptic termini) are grouped together, and the median ratio from each group is reported as the final ratio (“R”).

Retroviral Overexpression of FLAG-Tagged ZAK proteins in HEK-293T Cells

Full-length cDNA encoding human ZAK-β (BC001401) in pOTB7 was purchased from Open BioSystems and subcloned into pFLAG-CMV-6c (Sigma-Aldrich). ZAK-C22A and ZAK-K45M mutants were generated by QuikChange site-directed mutagenesis using the primer 5′-atttgatgacttgcagttttttgaaaacgccggtggaggaagttttg-3′ (SEQ ID NO:1) and 5′-ggacaaggaggtggctgtaatgaagctcctcaaaatagag-3′ (SEQ ID NO:2) and their complements. Wild-type and mutant ZAK were cloned into a modified pCLNCX retroviral vector. Retrovirus was prepared by taking 3.0 μg of each of pCLNCX and pCL-Ampho vectors and 18 μL of FuGENE HD reagent (Roche) to transfect 60% confluent HEK-293T cells. Medium was replaced after 1 day of transfection and on the next day virus-containing supernatant was collected, filter sterilized and stored at −70° C. 1 mL of virus-containing medium was used to infect target cells in presence of 8 μg/mL of polybrene for 72 hours and infected cells were selected in medium containing 100 μg/mL of hygromycin. Surviving cells after the selection were expanded and cultured in regular DMEM medium with 10% FCS.

Immunoprecipitation of FLAG-Tagged ZAK Proteins

HEK-293T cells with stable expression of wild-type or mutant ZAK were grown to 100% confluency on a 10 cm plate. Cells were collected, washed with cold PBS (2×10 mL) and lysed in 1 mL of PBS supplemented with 1× complete EDTA-free protease inhibitor cocktails by sonication. Cell lysates were fractionated by centrifugation (100,000×g, 45 min.) and the soluble fraction was incubated with 50 μL of Anti-FLAG M2 affinity gel (Sigma-Aldrich) at 4° C. for 3 hours. Beads were washed with 5×1 mL of cold PBS (10 min per incubation) and FLAG-ZAK were eluted by either 150 μg/mL of FLAG-peptide solution provided by manufacturer or by 4× gel loading buffer depending on the downstream applications.

In-Gel Fluorescence Characterization of ZAK Labeled by IA Probe

FLAG-tagged wild-type and C22A mutant ZAK were immunoprecipitated from HEK-293T cells (1×107). After washing with PBS, the beads were suspended in 100 μL of PBS buffer and labeled with 250 nM of IA-rhodamine (add 1 μL of 25 μM probe stock in DMSO). After 1 hour of labeling at 4° C., 50 μL of 4× gel loading buffer was added and the beads were boiled for 5 min to elute the bound proteins. Gel samples were separated by SDS-PAGE (50 μL of sample/lane) and visualized in-gel using a Hitachi FMBio II flatbed laser-induced fluorescence scanner (MiraiBio, Alameda, Calif.). For testing HNE blockade on IA labeling of ZAK by gel, soluble lysate of HEK-293T overexpressing WT-ZAK were incubated with 10, 50 and 100 μM of HNE (add 2 μL of 5, 25 and 50 mM stock) for 30 mins and then subjected to immunoprecipitation.

In-Gel Fluorescence Characterization of ZAK Labeled by HNEyne Probe

50 μL of soluble lysate (1 mg/mL in PBS) of HEK-239T cells transfected with mock ZAKWT and ZAK-C22A was labeled with 10 μM of HNEyne4 (Cayman Chemicals, 1 μL of 500 μM stock in ethanol) for 1 hour at room temperature. Cycloaddition was performed with 200 μM rhodamine-azide, 1 mM TCEP, 100 μM TBTA ligand and 1 mM CuSO₄. The reaction was allowed to proceed at room temperature for 1 hour before quenching with 20 μL of 4× SDS-PAGE loading buffer (reducing). Quenched reactions were separated by SDS-PAGE (40 μL of sample/lane) and visualized in-gel using a fluorescence scanner. For the in situ HNEyne labeling, WT- and C22A-ZAK transfected cells were grown in a 6-well plate to 100% confluency and switched into 1 mL of serum-free DMEM medium. Cells were labeled with 5 μM of HNEyne probe (1 μL of 5 mM stock) for 1 hour at 37° C. Cells were then harvested, washed with cold PBS and lysed in 200 μL of PBS with protease inhibitors. 50 μL of soluble lysates were subjected to the cycloaddition protocol as described above and probe labeling was monitored by in-gel fluorescence.

ZAK In Vitro Kinase Activity Assay

The kinase activity assay protocol was adapted from Yu et al⁵. Kinase assay buffers, Myeilin Basic Protein (MBP) substrate, and ATP stock solution were purchased from SignalChem. Radio-labeled [³³P]-ATP was purchased from PerkinElmer. 10 mg of soluble lysate of HEK-293T cells transfected with each of wild-type, C22A and K45M of ZAK were immunoprecipitated and then eluted with 2×300 μL FLAG-peptide buffer. Each sample was concentrated to 100 μL using an Amicon centrifugal filter (30 kDa cutoff) and exchanged to the assay kinase buffer (5 mM MOPS, pH7.2, 2.5 mM β-glycerol-phosphate, 5 mM MgCl2, 1 mM EGTA, 0.4 mM EDTA, 0.05 mM DTT and 40 ng/μL BSA) to a final volume around 10 μL. For each ZAK construct, 4 reactions were set up and each reaction starts with mixing 10 μL of immunoprecipiated ZAK, 5 μL of MBP (1 mg/mL) and 5 μL of HNE (10 or 100 μM) or H₂O together. No-enzyme and no-substrate controls were prepared in parallel. The mixed samples were incubated on ice for 15 min and 5 μL of [³³P]-ATP assay cocktail (250 μM, 167 μCi/mL) was then added to initiate the kinase reaction. Each reaction mixture was incubated in 30° C. for 15 min and the reaction was terminated by spotting 20 μL of the reaction mixture onto individual pre-cut strips of phosphocellulose P81 paper. The spotted P81 strips were air dried and then washed with 10 mL of 1% phosphoric acid for 3×10 min. ZAK activity was measured by counting the radioactivity on the P81 paper in the presence of scintillation fluid in a scintillation counter after subtracting the value obtained from the corresponding no substrate control, and was normalized to that of ZAK-WT without HNE treatment. Experiments were performed in triplicates. 10 μL of each ZAK variant used in setting up the kinase reaction were run on a SDS-PAGE gel and immunoblotted with an anti-FLAG antibody to ensure that they are enriched at similar levels.

Measurement of HNE Blockade of ATP Binding of ZAK by SILAC-ABPP

HEK-293T cells with stable expression of wild-type ZAK were passaged six times in DMEM medium minus 1-lysine and 1-arginine (Thermo) supplemented 10% dialyzed FBS (Gemini), 1% PSQ (1% vol/vol 10,000 units penicillin, 10 mg streptomycin, 29.2 mg lglutamate solution) and 100 μg/mL [¹³C₆, ¹⁵N₄] l-arginine-HCl and [¹³C₆, ¹⁵N₂] l-lysine-HCl (heavy) or 1-arginine-HCl and l-lysine-HCl (light) (Sigma-Aldrich). Soluble proteomes of light and heavy ZAK-WT transfected HEK-293T cells (3 mL each at 7 mg/mL) were treated with 100 μM of HNE (6 μL of 50 mM stock) or EtOH for 30 min at room temperature. The samples were gel filtrated by PD-10 columns (GE healthcare) to remove unreacted HNE as well as excessive ATP molecules in proteomes. Each aliquot of light and heavy proteomes (0.5 mL, 6 mg/mL) was labeled with 20 μM of acylphosphate-ATP probe (ActivX Biosciences) and then mixed together to proceed with reduction/alkylation, streptavidin enrichment, trypsin digest according to a modified version of the vendor-provided “Xsite Kinase Analysis” protocol6. The trypsin digested samples were analysed by LC-MS/MS and enriched kinase peptides were identified by SEQUEST and DTASelect. The amounts of probe-labeled kinases with and without HNE treatment were quantified using the CIMAGE module that was developed for quantitative SILAC-ABPP chemoproteomic profiling⁷. As internal controls, light and heavy proteomes were trypsin digested without probe labeling and streptavidin enrichment, and analysed by LC-MS/MS to quantify the basic level of each kinase between light and heavy samples. The normalized ratio, for each identified kinase, was computed by dividing the ratio from the probe-labeling experiment by that from the unenriched experiment, and these ratios (from four replicates) were used to calculate the means and standard deviations that were reported in FIG. 4 e.

Western Blotting of Phospho-MAPKs in ZAK-Transfected HEK-293T Cells.

Mouse and rabbit monoclonal antibodies against phospho-ERK 1/2 (Thr202/Tyr204), phosphor-SAPK/JNK (Thr183/Thr185), phosphor-p38 MAPK (Thr180/Thr182) and total ERK 1/2, SAPK/JNK and p38 MAPK were purchased from Cell Signaling Technology. HEK-293T cells transfected with mock, WT-ZAK, C22A-ZAK and K45M-ZAK were seeded into a 12-well plate with 2.5×10⁵ cells per well. Cells were grown in regular DMEM medium with 10% FBS for 24 hours and starved in serum-free DMEM medium for another 24 hours. Cells were then treated at 37° C. either with 100 μM of HNE (2 μL of 50 mM stock) for 30 min followed by 1 mM of H₂O₂ for 30 min, or with 50 and 100 μM of HNE alone for 60 min. After the treatment, cells were harvested, washed with 2×1 mL of cold PBS, and then lysed by sonication in 100 μL of PBS buffer supplemented with 1× complete protease inhibitors cocktail and 1×PhosSTOP phosphatase inhibitors cocktail (Roche). 30 μg of soluble lysate of each sample was separated by SDS-PAGE, transferred to nitrocellulose membrane, blocked in 5% milk TBST and blotted against the primary antibodies (1:2000) listed above for 16 hours at 4° C. After washing in TBST (3×10 minutes), membranes were blotted with IRDye secondary antibodies (1:10,000) for 1 hour at room temperature and scanned by an Odyssey imaging system (LI-COR). Protein band intensities were quantified by ImageJ8 and ratios of phosphor-MAPK over total MAPK were computed. Experiments were repeated in at least four replicates.

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All patents and publications referred to herein are incorporated by reference herein to the same extent as if each individual publication was specifically and individually indicated to be incorporated by reference in its entirety.

The terms and expressions which have been employed are used as terms of description and not of limitation, and there is no intention that in the use of such terms and expressions of excluding any equivalents of the features shown and described or portions thereof, but it is recognized that various modifications are possible within the scope of the invention claimed. Thus, it should be understood that although the present invention has been specifically disclosed by preferred embodiments and optional features, modification and variation of the concepts herein disclosed may be resorted to by those skilled in the art, and that such modifications and variations are considered to be within the scope of this invention as defined by the appended claims. 

1-15. (canceled)
 16. A protein identified as a target of a lipid-derived electrophile by the method comprising: (a) contacting a first set of proteins of a mammalian cell with the lipid-derived electrophile, wherein the lipid-derived electrophile is a cysteine-reactive lipid-derived electrophile to generate an alkylated set of proteins; (b) contacting the alkylated set of proteins with an alkynylated iodoacetamide probe, followed by reaction with an azido compound comprising a first isotopic marker, to provide an isotopically-marked alkylated set of proteins, wherein the reaction with the azido compound is carried out using a copper-catalyzed azide-alkyne cycloaddition reaction; (c) contacting the first set of proteins of a mammalian cell of step (a), not exposed to the lipid-derived electrophile, with an alkynylated iodoacetamide probe, followed by reaction with an azido compound comprising a second isotopic marker, to provide an isotopically-marked control set of proteins, wherein the reaction with the azido compound is carried out using a copper-catalyzed azide-alkyne cycloaddition reaction; (d) combining the isotopically-marked alkylated set of proteins and the isotopically-marked control set of proteins to provide a combined sample; (e) quantifying reactivities of the isotopically-marked alkylated set of proteins and the isotopically-marked control set of proteins to identify a protein target by comparing the abundance of the first isotopic marker and the abundance of the second isotopic marker for each protein of the combined sample; and (g) identifying the protein target and sites of modification of the electrophile.
 17. The protein of claim 16, wherein the first set of proteins includes two or more proteins.
 18. The protein of claim 16, wherein the lipid-derived electrophile is a stress-induced electrophile.
 19. The protein of claim 16, wherein lipid-derived electrophile comprises a Michael acceptor having an α,β-unsaturated carbonyl group.
 20. The protein of claim 16, wherein the lipid-derived electrophile undergoes a Michael conjugate addition reaction with a cysteine residue of one or more proteins of the first set of proteins.
 21. The protein of claim 16, wherein the lipid-derived electrophile is 4-hydroxynonenal (HNE) or 15-deoxy-Al 2,14-prostaglandin J2 (15d-PGJ2).
 22. The protein of claim 16, wherein the first isotopic marker and the second isotopic marker are isotopically-differentiated azide-biotin tags.
 23. The protein of claim 16 wherein the protein target possess at least 5-fold or higher ratio of the second isotopic marker to the first isotopic marker among the proteins of the combined sample.
 24. The protein of claim 16 wherein the site of cysteine modification by a lipid-derived electrophile is at a non-active site.
 25. The protein of claim 16 wherein the protein is a kinase.
 26. The protein of claim 25, wherein the kinase is ZAK kinase. 